Information technology has really gone through a big change for the twenty years it allegedly existed. That's roughly a year after I was born. Perhaps if the internet was a human being, he/she'd be a tall, physically able person who also has the brains to go with the brawn.Basically, what I thought of about the internet before was that it was a huge network of information--nothing more. It would supply information to people
who seek them, give people the chance to share their own information to other people, whether academically or otherwise. Now, not only does the web inform--it empowers.
What the "Digital Natives" have yet to realize (and perhaps some of the older generations, too) is that these massive volumes of information can actually empower them in a way that their generation, and possibly future generations, would have the ability of being even better than us. People can easily self-educate--they can learn things of interest but originally not in their "line of work", or, more appropriately, outside the classroom.
I can personally attest to this. I have been an engineering student for almost three years before I became a broadcast major. My interests shifted, but still I was inclined to be tech-savvy. I stuck to my hobbies--tinkering with anything that has to do with technology. I was looking up news about it. Basically I knew a lot when it comes to technology and that's why they call me the 'tech guru' and they ask me for advice every time they need their laptops repaired or softwares installed. In this way, the internet has made it easier for me to pursue one of my hobbies while I study another of them altogether. Internet has made it easy for me to have multiple interests and gratified my need for information regarding them.
Of course, if I can easily access information that can help me and my friends, the internet also makes it easy for shady people to access shady information. I won't put up links here, lest it risk the integrity and security of the blog and its contributors, but I know for a fact that a lot of how-to's are available in the net, positive or any degree otherwise. Even with the ease of tracking the internet and its users provide, there's little to no regulation in terms of what information is available, not to mention lack of legislation in most of even the internet-heavy countries out there.
In this regard, we digital natives (I've considered myself part of it even if I'm a year or so off the mark) have an even bigger responsibility of screening what information we put--and take from--the web. This is, of course, common sense, but we also have the added responsibility of educating those that do lack this sense. As those educated with the internet and all its nuances and social implications, ideally we should know what things we have to educate the generation with.
I know that the whole internet-is-dumbing-us-down thing has a certain truth to it. It does--only if we let it do that. At the end of the day, it's still just a technology, and it's always going to be something we can use for our own. It's not completely an entity that controls how we live. It only will if we let it.
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It's not completely an entity that controls how we live. It only will if we let it. - AGREE.
ReplyDeleteI hope the time where robots or machines would take over us would never come. I think one thing that we have that they don't is the ability to feel, legit emotions... And that's something the internet or technology can never have (hopefully). :)
-Jara Lucero